Conference Program

This contribution engages with the socio-pedagogical debate on educational inequalities by focusing on teachers’ professional cultures and narratives as central elements in the co-construction of differences between students and in the differentiation of educational trajectories. In particular, the paper investigates how teachers’ professional narratives, expectations, and discursive practices may contribute, in the absence of intentionality, to the reproduction or interruption of educational inequalities affecting students with migratory backgrounds. Teachers’ narratives represent a privileged lens through which to understand how inclusion policies and discourses on equality are translated into everyday educational practices. Through these narratives, processes of recognition, evaluation, and orientation are shaped, influencing students’ opportunities.

The research is guided by the following question: how do teachers’ narratives and expectations contribute to shaping the educational trajectories of students with migratory backgrounds, particularly in institutional moments such as school orientation? The analysis adopts the concepts of structural and cultural violence as its theoretical lens, highlighting how educational inequalities may be produced and legitimized through institutional practices, expectations, and seemingly neutral representations. From this perspective, teachers’ agency represents a crucial space in which such dynamics may either be reproduced or challenged.

The contribution also emphasizes the researcher’s dual positioning as both a school principal working in educational contexts characterized by high social complexity and a doctoral researcher in Peace Studies. This positioning makes it possible to combine an insider perspective on organizational processes of schools with a critical approach attentive to issues of justice and recognition in educational contexts. The research is situated in the province of Parma, a territory characterized by a significant presence of students with migratory backgrounds and by a tradition of inclusive educational policies that coexist with persistent dynamics of school stratification.

From a methodological perspective, the study adopts a qualitative research design combining sources of data. Semi-structured interviews are conducted with teachers and school staff to explore narratives, representations, and expectations toward students with migratory backgrounds. The research also collects biographical narratives from university students with migratory backgrounds who reconstruct their school trajectories, highlighting experiences of discrimination or downward orientation. Data collection is further complemented by a territorial focus group conceived as a space for professional reflexivity. Specific attention is devoted to comparing teachers’ narratives across different segments of the school system, particularly between primary school and lower secondary school. Preliminary analyses suggest that primary schools tend to value students’ personal stories more strongly, whereas in lower secondary school teachers’ discourses interpret a presumed reluctance among students to share their stories. Particular attention is also devoted to the institutional moment of school orientation at the end of lower secondary education, where expectations, evaluative judgments, and representations of students’ potential assume a performative role in shaping their future trajectories.

The contribution invites reflection on whether teachers’ professional cultures constitute a decisive terrain for advancing democratic education and how transforming the narrative frameworks through which educators interpret students’ migratory experiences might contribute to more equitable education systems.